Open doors - the changing publishing scene

We're always reading things about how impossible it is to submit to a mainstream publisher.  For most of the last decade I'd agree that was true.  Most big publishers had closed their doors to unsolicited submissions, and the only way in was via an equally-hard-to-get agent's representation.  But I think that in the last five years the balance of power has shifted.

A big driver of this change is the self-publishing boom.  Twenty years ago when I was first starting to submit things there was nowhere else to go.  Before the arrival of print on demand, publishing a book would have cost you a lot of money.  And even if you could afford to get your book printed, where would you sell it?  You wouldn't be able to persuade the big booksellers to stock it.  

Enter Amazon, and the opening-up of publishing to everyone.  Today, if you're willing to do all the design and tech work yourself, you can upload your book for ebook readers, or for a print on demand paperback, without it costing you a penny.  And high-profile success stories like Hugh Howey's show how a self-published author can catch the attention of the big publishers.

But another way that self-publishing has changed mainstream publishing is by encouraging publishers to open up to unsolicited submissions again.  Enter the Ooen Door reading period.  Yesterday I read an advance notice that Angry Robot will be having another Ooen Door reading period this December.  This is a great development for unagented authors.  Getting an agent has long been as hard as getting a publishing  deal, and in past years, without an agent, you had no access to publishers.

Things have become more fluid now.  Several well-regarded mainstream published authors have turned to self-publishing when their book deals ran out.  Their names were already known, and they had a loyal readership that they could reach easily via Amazon.  Some authors have been disillusioned by inappropriate covers for their books, and the publisher's desire to market the book as something it wasn't.  So they've taken back control, and have self published.

Open Doors are one way that publishers have found to deal with the challenge of the self-published alternative.  And imprints like Angry Robot have offered contracts to several authors who submitted to them during Open Door periods.  So come December, I'll have finished the final edits on Auroradawn, and I plan to submit that and Genehunter to them.  Wish me luck,